Something Real
by Hidge
Summary: Oneshot set after 3x17 - "In Heat". JJ reflects on her life, her work, and a certain detective. Please R&R!


**A/N: This is a birthday oneshot for a friend so I hope that she enjoys it and that you guys do too! :)**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Criminal Minds or any of its characters. I also do not own any of the lines taken directly from "In Heat".**

JJ boarded the plane as if she were in an entirely different world. Emily's contented sigh as she sat down in a comfortable chair, the coffee pot beginning to percolate, and Reid falling onto the couch on the back of the jet after tripping over his own feet all went unnoticed. She took the seat closest to the exit and began to unload files from her bag. She needed to choose the BAU's next case. She picked up a case file sent from Omaha, Nebraska and began to read the request.

Her concentration was broken when her mind drifted to thoughts of William LaMontagne Jr., the man that she has been secretly seeing for a year. She chuckled silently to herself at the use of the word secretly. She practically lived with a group of profilers. She had always done her best to keep her guard up but deep down she had known that they had had their suspicions. Once she had started rejecting relaxing weekend invitations in favour of "family plans" and turning down requests to unwind at the bar because she was "dead tired and needed her sleep", they began to ask silent questions with subtle glances. While in reality, she had travelled to New Orleans on most weekends and spent long nights on the phone venting her feelings of frustration about a recent case.

And she couldn't believe that it had all started with an awkward phone conversation.

"_Jennifer Jareau," she answered formally._

"_Hi, it's Bill LaMontagne," she heard the familiar New Orleans accent say._

"_Oh hey," she responded ineloquently. But it was all that she could do; his phone call had taken her by surprise._

"_How are you?" He asked routinely and immediately regretted his opening line._

"_I'm fine thanks and how are you?" She replied politely._

_He took a long, pause before he chuckled gracelessly. "I decided that I agree with you, cell phones are good for your health." She smiled to herself as she sat back down in her office chair. "I know that this is kinda outta left field but would you like to make this a regular or even semi-regular thing?"_

_She laughed lightly, "Actually yeah, I don't really talk to many people outside the BAU."_

_He laughed along with her. "Well I'm certainly not BAU."_

She shifted in her seat and crossed her legs. The file from Omaha became more and more "ordinary" the deeper she got into it. How terrible was that? That she had seen so many horrors with the BAU that she was jaded to murdered, young women looking up at her from the cold ground. The job that she was doing had devoured so many before her and a part of her felt that it was only a matter of time before it was her turn. That was one reason that she loved spending time with Will, he had a way of making her forget that she was the gatekeeper, that she held the key to the valuable resource that was the BAU. He had had that ability from the very first weekend that they had spent together, as friends.

_JJ and Will stumbled into his house and out of the rain. They were both soaked from head to toe and wore nothing more than jeans and t-shirts. "I thought that it only rained in New Orleans during hurricane season."_

_He chuckled and flashed his white, toothy grin that was mesmerizing. "I guess that that's the result of global warming." She laughed as she shook out her long, golden blonde hair. "Would you like a towel?"_

"_Please," she smiled._

_He dashed into his bathroom and quickly returned with a towel for her to dry her hair in. "Here you are."_

"_Thanks," she said gratefully._

"_No problem, men should open doors and pick up the check."_

"_And a woman's place is in the kitchen?" She asked, testing the waters of his societal views._

_He shook his head. "I totally disagree with you there honey."_

_She smiled brightly. "Good."_

"_So what are we supposed to do now? I was going to take you out to dinner but its raining cats and dogs," he explained with a smile._

"_Well I guess that we can eat in. How are your cooking skills?" She asked flirtatiously._

_He smiled, "Pretty good."_

Her brunette co-worker interrupted the pleasant memory. Emily took a seat across from her and stared at her with a mischievous grin. "What are you doing?"

She looked up from her file and gave her friend a weak smile. "Trying to pick out our next case."

"Is Will gone back to New Orleans?" Emily asked inquisitively.

"He's leaving tomorrow morning."

"Garcia is going to be jealous, she missed quite the kiss," the brunette stated cheerfully.

She laughed quietly, "Yeah she's probably going to kill me." She continued to smile to herself, the kiss that her and Will had shared earlier in the day reminded her of their very first kiss.

"_Leaving me again?" Will asked playfully._

"_Duty calls," she answered regretfully. "But once again, I had a really great time."_

"_This is our fourth straight weekend together," he stated with a devious smirk as he stepped up to her._

"_It is," she smirked back._

"_Do I get a kiss now?" He asked impishly._

"_I dunno," she replied teasingly as she tapped her chin with her index finger._

_With her high heel shoes on, they were the same height so closing the gap between them was relatively easy for him. He tilted his head and leaned forward until his lips were pressed against hers. Her lips were soft, warm, and inviting. He wound a hand in her silky hair as he deepened the kiss. Her arms wrapped around his neck and pulled him closer until there was no space between them. _

_They reluctantly pulled apart when they both felt the desperate need to breath but after a few sharp intakes of air, they returned to their previous activities. "You have a flight soon and a cab outside," he whispered as he tore his lips away from hers and found the soft flesh of her neck._

"_Screw it," she panted._

_He shook his head. "No, you have to go, we can continue this next weekend," he smiled. She sighed heavily and it only made his smile widen. He tangled both of his hands in her hair and gave her one last passionate kiss before he kissed her sweetly on the top of the head. "I'll call you later tonight okay?"_

_She nodded, "Okay."_

"_Have a safe flight," he said before he opened the door to his house and watched as she walked down the driveway and towards her awaiting cab._

She sighed with satisfaction as she felt a wave of warm air rush over her. Emily had moved to the back of the plane as soon as she found herself falling asleep. It hadn't bothered her, she enjoyed talking to Emily but she wasn't in the mood tonight. Too many thoughts were making their way across her brain. She had recently spilt her guts to the man that she's been seeing for a year. She couldn't even remember the last time that she had a serious boyfriend; it was definitely before the BAU. In fact, it was probably during college. She had dated Robert Barnes for a year and a half. He was an enthusiastic journalism major, like herself, who worked as a lifeguard at the local YMCA. He was cute with shaggy, untamed, dark hair and misty grey eyes. They had parted when she had moved to New York and he had chosen Los Angeles. It hadn't been love but it had been a relationship.

With Will, she knew that she had stumbled upon something special very early on, even though she hadn't wanted to admit it. She still remembered the first time that they had slept together. It had been completely spontaneous yet they had both been ready.

"_Will!" JJ called out as she entered his house using the key that he had given her after their second month of weekend visits._

"_Hold on a sec honey," he answered from back in his bedroom._

_After several minutes, he appeared in the living room, he had just hopped out of the shower. "Why didn't you tell me when you were coming? I would have picked you up at the airport."_

"_I know," she smiled as she walked towards him. "But I wanted to surprise you."_

_She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him quickly. "Do you want to go out for dinner?" She shook her head. "Are you hungry?" She shook her head once again. "Then what do you want to do?" He asked chuckling._

_She kissed him again, except hungrier and more urgent then last time. "Let's just see where this takes us."_

_He picked her up into his arms and deposited her gently onto the sofa in the middle of his living room. He looked down at her uncertainly as he tentatively began to open the buttons of her blouse. She encouraged him with her hands and her kisses and he quickly became comfortable._

_They were down to their undergarments when he lifted her up and carried her into his bedroom. Even though there was no one else in the house, he shut the door with his foot. He kissed her eagerly as they toppled onto the bed. She whimpered at the loss of his body heat as they separated and he walked towards his dresser. He quickly pulled a small item out of a drawer before joining her on the bed._

"_You sure you wanna do this?" He asked considerately._

_She nodded and gave him a sincere smile. "Yes."_

_He smiled back at her as he leaned in and kissed her sweetly. She fell back onto the mattress and pulled him down with her._

She had never really shown her true self to anyone that she had dated before Will. It was never something that she had admitted to herself but she had been told by friends that she has a fear of intimacy. But what she had told Will had been the naked truth. She had run from the possibility of getting hurt for her entire life. It was like second nature to her.

"_It's not that I didn't want them to know, I don't care about that. It's not about the relocating; it's not about traveling on the weekends, or some guy. It's... I didn't want to tell anyone because the minute I do, it becomes real. And when it becomes real, people get hurt. And I... I've always run from getting hurt, always, and I don't want to run anymore. Not from you, and..."  
_

"_JJ just shut up." He cut her off by grabbing her and kissing her._

She placed the file in her lap back in her bag and turned to look out the window. The sky was black and blanketed with very few stars. She glanced at her watch; they would be getting ready to descend any minute now. She looked around the plane and saw that her co-workers were beginning to sit up in their seats and pack their things away. Emily had just awoken from her slumber, Reid was putting his coffee mug back in its spot, and Morgan had just pulled his MP3 player headphones out of his ears.

She was looking forward to going back to her comfortable home and receiving a call from her boyfriend. She rolled her eyes at herself; she was acting like a high school girl with a really big crush. But maybe that was how she was supposed to be feeling? She had finally found something real.

**The End**


End file.
